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from the making-gratis-and-libre-tools-even-better dept.
KiCAD is a GPL'd Electronics Design Automation (EDA) suite with schematic capture and printed circuit board layout abilities. Its capabilities continue to expand.
Hackaday reports
[...] five years ago, if you wanted to design a printed circuit board, your best option was [Cadsoft's Easily Applicable Graphical Layout Editor (EAGLE)]. [These days], EAGLE is an Autodesk property, the licensing model has changed, [...] and the Open Source EDA suite KiCAD is getting better and better. New developers are contributing to the project and, by some measures, KiCAD is now the most popular tool to develop Open [Design] hardware.
At FOSDEM last week, Wayne Stambaugh, project lead of KiCAD laid out what features are due in the upcoming release of version 5 [Video]. KiCAD just keeps improving, and these new features are really killer features that will make everyone [who is] annoyed with EAGLE's new licensing very happy.
Although recent versions of KiCAD have made improvements to the way part and footprint libraries are handled, the big upcoming change is that footprint libraries will be installed locally. The Github plugin for library management--a good idea in theory--is no longer the default.
SPICE [Simulation Program with Integrated Circuit Emphasis] is also coming to KiCAD. The best demo of the upcoming SPICE integration is this relatively old video demonstrating how KiCAD turns a schematic into graphs of voltage and current.
The biggest news, however, is the new ability to import EAGLE projects. Wayne demoed this live on stage, importing an EAGLE board and schematic of an Arduino Mega and turning it into a KiCAD board and schematic in a matter of seconds. It's not -quite- perfect yet, but it's close and very, very good.
There are, of course, other fancy features that make designing schematics and PCBs easier. Eeschema is getting a better configuration dialog, improved bus and wire dragging, and improved junction handling. Pcbnew is getting rounded rectangle and complex pad shape support, direct export to STEP files, and you'll soon be able to update the board from the schematic without updating the netlist file. Read that last feature again, slowly. It's the best news we've ever heard.
The author is tolerant of subtractive changes to proprietary licenses; other hardware hackers/tool users, in the comments there, not so much.
Previous: A Tool to Export EAGLE Projects for Use With FOSS ECADs
Cadsoft EAGLE is Now Subscription-Only
Scripts Make the (Proprietary) Cadsoft EAGLE-to-(FOSS) KiCAD Transition Easier
FOSS Printed Circuit Software KiCAD 4.0 Released
CERN is Getting Serious About Development of the KiCAD App for Designing Printed Circuits
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Grishnakh on Monday February 12 2018, @09:30PM (16 children)
It doesn't matter how great they make KiCAD. EAGLE will continue to be the standard, no matter how awful its licensing gets, because tons of hobbyists and engineers working on at-home projects keep recommending it for some reason, probably because a bunch of them have been using it for ages and all their projects are in it and they refuse to change (even if KiCAD can import those projects). Among professionals, it's even worse, as from what I've seen, hardware engineers (esp. American ones) are generally big fans of Windows and proprietary tools and turn their noses up at Free software.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday February 12 2018, @09:37PM (2 children)
After reading a bunch of the comments on that article, though, I have to say I really like the attitude those commenters have towards Autodesk/Cadsoft, and their pointing out the corruption at hackaday.com.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 13 2018, @12:01AM (1 child)
I don't know that I'd go that far, but there certainly is a bias WRT Brian and a tolerance for proprietary software and changes to the licenses on those.
Apparently, some like the clanking noises made the chains they choose to wear.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday February 13 2018, @04:20AM
Go read the comments: they explicitly point out the conflict of interest between Brian and Cadsoft.
(Score: 2) by BananaPhone on Monday February 12 2018, @10:00PM (6 children)
Give it time. LibreOffice was built in a day either.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday February 12 2018, @10:07PM (5 children)
Not a great comparison. LibreOffice descends from StarOffice, which was commercial software; it wasn't a hobbyist project initially. Also, LO has far wider appeal than EDA software, since most desktop computer users want an office suite. Finally, KiCad has been around for many years now, it's not new by any stretch.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 12 2018, @10:57PM (2 children)
I switched a friend to kicad and he switch a few people at a maker club, even if the target audiences differ the technique behind the gospel is the same
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday February 13 2018, @04:15AM (1 child)
I doubt it: different crowd. The "makers" tend to be much younger and more liberal, and not experienced engineers who generally are a bunch of Randian libertarians who think Free software is "communism" or similar.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 13 2018, @04:21PM
It saddens me that pseudo libertarianism is as close as the older engineers can get to decency. Guess all the jokes about social ineptitude were right.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 12 2018, @11:33PM
StarOffice [started as] commercial software
Yes, StarOffice started out as closed-source stuff.
It was written by a single individual, Marco Börries, for an 8-bit system.
He later ported it to other platforms.
It took him a year before his thing was incorporated, and I can't find any evidence which says, at that point, that he had any additional employees.
In the meantime, StarOffice and OpenOffice have passed through the hands of multiple owners.
LibreOffice, OTOH, has -always- been FOSS--as was its direct antecedent (OpenOffice) and has always had the same foundational ownership.
I'm guessing there isn't a single developer of LibreOffice who doesn't use the suite and that all of them want it to get even better.
Not a great comparison
Hmmm. KiCAD was initially a project of Jean-Pierre Charras, a French academic.
The suite has always been FOSS.
Its developers receive their income via entities other than the KiCAD project and, in many cases, those are entities who use the software (e.g. CERN).
Again, ISTM that the devs are also users and want the software to improve.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 12 2018, @11:53PM
I guess the LHC is a kind of hobby
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Joe Desertrat on Monday February 12 2018, @10:58PM (5 children)
To their minds they generally don't have to pay for it out of their pockets, or it is a business deduction if they do. They are going to fight any change to what they use tooth and nail...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 12 2018, @11:51PM
[Users of proprietary tools] are going to fight any change to what they use
Good luck with that, guys.
The big fish swallow up the little fish, then stop supporting and/or make obsolete the wares of their former competitors.
...particularly in the ECAD market.
I saw it repeatedly in the days I was reading sci.electronics.design|sci.electronics.cad.
...then there are license changes.
In a previous story, the comments at TFA had a guy whose company didn't allow machines with work product on them to access any network.
Installs|updates were done via disks and data transfers were done via sneakernet.
The new Cadsoft-cum-Autodesk paradigm requires an internet connection to periodically phone home to verify the license.
For that guy, that broke compatibility with the proprietary wares.
Foot, meet bullet.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday February 13 2018, @04:05AM (3 children)
No, I'm not talking about what they use at work, where you're right, they don't care much because their employer is footing the bill. I'm talking about what they do for their at-home projects. These people, by and large, are just not supporters of or interested in Free software. Strangely, they even think Windows is a great platform for doing serious engineering work...
(Score: 2) by frojack on Tuesday February 13 2018, @06:17AM (2 children)
So you get your produce designed using the opensoure software.
Then you want to ship it to China to get it replicated.
Nobody over there knows a thing about KiCad.
You get to redo it in what the industry wants.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 13 2018, @07:59AM
Wanna bet?
...and there are standard file formats that you give a PCB fabrication house e.g. Gerber.
KiCAD produces those just fine.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday February 13 2018, @04:20PM
You don't know what Gerbers are, do you?
I've been sending KiCad-designed boards to China for many years now.
(Score: 2) by morpheus on Tuesday February 13 2018, @12:16AM (2 children)
I have not used KiCAD much, just a couple of times but I have used PCB a lot and I tried to use Eagle. For my personal projects I have a rather long development cycle so the ability to document and change formats is paramount. Both KiCAD's and PCB's formats are exceptionally well documented, everything is scriptable. Eagle is probably workable but I cannot imagine working on something for three years only to lose all my work or get it locked away from me by a version change or the new OS upgrade and the lack of a new license. The Eagle guys play with words when they say that 'nobody promised lifetime support'. I do not need a lifetime of new features but if you sold me something that has bugs (without workarounds) make sure you fix them and above all, if I switch to a new computer and a new version of Linux, I expect to bring all my software with me. The car analogy they give falls short is multiple respects. Finally, having worked with Eagle a few times (admittedly a long time ago) I did not find it all that convenient, although it was a notch above terrible. I admit, I have fixed a few bugs in PCB by hand so I did not shy away from the dirty work.
I would not even mention that this whole 'cloud' craze is pure greed and one would be insane to trust that these companies would not abuse (especially Autodesk) the ability to hold your work ransom to their licensing schemes. Ok, there, I did mention it ...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 13 2018, @01:49AM (1 child)
Useful app; descriptive name (more or less); very difficult to Google up, however.
Originally developed by Thomas Nau for the Amiga.
Later, ported to other platforms.
Development/support subsequently taken up by Harry Eaton.
At one point, it seemed that DJ Delorie was the prime supporter.
Early page; [archive.org] Last page there was in 2007. [archive.org]
It has since become part of the gEDA "suite".
(One assumes that you use gschem for schematic capture.)
.
this whole 'cloud' craze is pure greed
Amen.
and one would be insane to trust that these companies would not abuse
Amen.
Over a decade ago, Cadsoft put DRM in their stuff which punished folks who weren't aware that they had done anything wrong.
The company wouldn't help legitimately licensed users recover and, of course, they said nothing about this in their license.
I've previously mentioned [soylentnews.org] at some length the revelations of Markus Zingg back in 2006. [electrondepot.com]
For me, proprietary software lost its luster long ago.
Time and again, I've found that the people in that business are just slime.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday February 13 2018, @04:07AM
Time and again, I've found that the people in that business are just slime.
Aren't most people?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 13 2018, @01:39AM (1 child)
https://olimex.wordpress.com/2018/02/08/this-is-fosdem-2018/#comment-29471 [wordpress.com]
Is the Bazaar dead? Only Cathedrals with source from now on?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 13 2018, @02:07AM
The KiCAD leadership notoriously has zero inclination to compromise
I notice that he didn't mention what his alternative might be.
(The subjects of gift horses and mouths occur to me.)
...and that steadfastness sounds a lot like a particular Benevolent Dictator for Life. [google.com]
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by crafoo on Tuesday February 13 2018, @01:56AM (5 children)
KiCAD is one of those open source projects that made me a believer in the whole concept. It's very good. I've designed PCBs with it and had them manufactured. Double-sided, with solder mask and silk screen. Starting from their schematic editor, and doing some pad definitions and editing as needed. Maybe not much to a pro, but I'm mostly a self-taught hobbyist. It's incredible how good this software is. I'm curious if autorouting will be a thing, or better integrated?
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 13 2018, @02:11AM (4 children)
So, you're saying that at some point you've seen an autorouter that was worth a hoot in hell?
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday February 13 2018, @04:11AM (1 child)
If you think you can efficiently hand-route an extremely complex board by hand, in a reasonable amount of time, I have a bridge to sell you. And routing a board with high-speed signals by hand is pretty infeasible, as you have to control trace lengths precisely.
I've used the FreeRouter that KiCad links to, and it works pretty well. Of course, I end up making lots of hand edits to it, but the autorouter is good for doing a first pass.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 22 2018, @06:39AM
I've used the FreeRouter that KiCad links to
Today, Hackaday has put up a notice:
In the comments there, PWalsh started a subthread on FreeRouter. [hackaday.com] Comments run from
to
Some "intellectual property" wranglings were mentioned as well.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by EETech1 on Tuesday February 13 2018, @07:19AM (1 child)
I used the eagle autorouter for my quickcircuit prototype board layouts, and once you priced the features to get the results you wanted, it wasn't half bad. It was very useful to show you areas of the board that could use further optimization in the component placements!
So, it was useful for pointing out that if you just moved these couple things a little bit, all these other things would go a whole lot smoother!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 22 2018, @06:42AM
once you priced the features to get the results you wanted
Today, Hackaday has put up a notice:
In the comments there, [hackaday.com] Beef says
Pat says
D00med says
elmesito says
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]